I. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to maintaining a sterile and sanitized environment by enforcing personal sanitization and hygiene. More particularly, the present invention relates to sanitization in public settings including but not limited to healthcare settings, restaurants, public restrooms, and other locations where disease and germs may be spread. The cost of fighting hospital acquired infections is estimated to be at least $30 billion per year. The drug-resistant forms of these infections, such as MRSA, can cost $30,000 per case to combat. Sadly, these infections kill more than 90,000 Americans every year. MRSA kills around 18,000 people every year. Most of these infections are transferred from patient to patient on surfaces that are not sanitized, particularly on the hands of people such as staff and visitors.
The present invention provides a simple method that mechanically ensures that a person sanitizes his/her hands. Unclean hands assist in the spread of infections. Thus, unclean hands cost patients, hospitals and insurance companies a large sum of money combating such infections. The present invention ensures sterilization of the user's hands and prevents the introduction and spread of infections from a user's hands. The present invention also creates an economic benefit by reducing the costs associated with combating such infections.
Restaurants and healthcare settings such as hospitals have hygiene requirements that require their staff and employees to clean their hands. Often, restaurants and hospitals rely on an honor type system to remind the employees and staff to wash their hands. Signs also remind users to clean their hands. Even with the mandatory requirements and signs, users continue to improperly wash their hands. Furthermore, many users only rinse their hands with water that does not properly sanitize the user's hands.
II. Description of the Known Art
Patents and patent applications disclosing information relevant to hygienic systems are disclosed below. These patents and patent applications are hereby expressly incorporated by reference in their entirety.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,458,742 issued to Stropkay on Dec. 2, 2008 (“the '742 patent”) teaches a door handle and liquid dispensing apparatus including a housing configured to attach to an associated door and a porous material. The housing taught by the '742 patent at least partially defines a reservoir configured to hold a liquid for cleaning a person's hand when the person opens the associated door. The porous material is disposed in and extends from the reservoir. A portion of the porous material is disposed adjacent a location typically touched by the person's hand when opening the associate door.
The invention taught by the '742 patent is configured to provide hand sanitizing and/or hand cleaning liquid, which includes lotion, to a person whether the person pushes against the assembly 10 to open the door or pulls the assembly 10 to open the door. The assembly 10 taught by the '742 patent is described as a “door handle” assembly; however, the term “door handle” or “handle” is not limited to simply a bar that is grasped and pulled to open the door to which the bar is attached. The term “door handle” or “handle” as used in the '742 patent refers to a portion of the assembly that is typically touched by the person's hand when opening the door, whether it be by pushing or pulling the door.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,044,904 issued to Heisig on Jun. 23, 1936 (“the '904 patent”) teaches a means for automatically supplying to the hands of the user a restricted and minute amount of a liquid antiseptic as an instant of the user rotating the knob. The '904 patent teaches two liquid containing compartments filled with a watery solution of a suitable antiseptic, preferably by the use of a pressure syringe into discharge vents which in this case function as filling vents and the liquid as intruded raised in the compartment. The '904 patent teaches when a user passes his fingers across the outer face of the vent incidental to rotating the knob the operator withdraws through the vent, apparently by a frictional or perhaps by an adhesion action, a minute quantity of the antiseptic solution.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,029,600 issued to Davis on Feb. 29, 2000 (“the '600 patent”) teaches a device for assuring that restroom users are effectively reminded to wash and cleanse their hands. The '600 patent teaches a spray pump attached adjacent to an exterior door-handle to a restroom and is activated either by the turning of the handle or by the opening of the door. The spray pump taught by the '600 patent includes a spray nozzle which sprays the user's front palm and/or back of the hand with a dye stain when the door-handle is opened. The '600 patent teaches that the dye stain is non-toxic fast drying and easily washable with cleanser such as soap and water. The dye stain taught by the '600 patent can be visible in natural light and include colors such as red, yellow, blue and the like. Alternatively, the dye stain taught by the '600 patent can be only visible to infrared light. The device taught by the '600 patent can be used with round circular door-handles and lever door-handles. The '600 patent teaches that a shield around the door handle can discourage attempts to defeat the staining.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,896,144 issued to Bogstad on Jan. 23, 1990 (“the '144 patent”) teaches a warning system adapted to warn someone to wash their hands prior to leaving or entering a facility in which hand washing is important. The '144 patent teaches a system that includes a door activated system that can be either visible or audible or both and can include a door locking system and a remote signalling system. The warning system taught by the '144 patent is armed when the door is opened to permit entry into the facility and is de-activated upon the acutation of hand-washing facilities. In one embodiment, the system taught by the '144 patent is used in a bathroom and the warning system can be activated by the flushing of a toilet.
The '144 patent also teaches that the consequences of not washing one's hands after using the bathroom are so dire as to require extreme measures to ensure that hands are always washed after using the bathroom. In such extreme situations, the '144 patent teaches that the door 12 can be locked after entry and only unlocked after the hand washing facilities have been used. The control unit 36 and the ingress and egress signaling systems taught by the '144 patent can be used to carry out this function. For this, the system 10 taught by the '144 patent includes a door locking element 80 on the door frame and connected to the control unit 36 via a line connector 82 and adapted to co-operate with a locking mechanism 84 on the door to prevent opening of the door unless the hand washing facilities have been activated. The '144 patent teaches that upon activating a hand-washing facility, a signal can be sent to the control unit 36 to unlock the door via the just-described door locking system.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,967,478 issued to Guinn on Jul. 6, 1976 (“the '478 patent”) teaches an apparatus for unlatching a door to a hygienic area actuated by sensor electrodes in contact with the electrolytic residue of a cleansing agent upon the hand or limb of a person desiring access to the hygienic area. The '478 patent teaches that the personnel desiring entry must have washed or cleansed his hands or arms or other limbs with the required germicidal cleansing agent, such as soap, which will normally leave a sufficient electrolytic residue on his hand to establish a current between the electrodes when the hand is placed in contact with both electrodes. The '478 patent teaches that the current established through the electrolytic residue and the electrodes will then actuate the switch device to close the circuit through the coil of the electromagnetic bolt mechanism for unlatching the door, thereby permitting entry to the hygienic area.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,390,817 issued to Heropoulus on Jul. 2, 1968 (“the '817 patent”) teaches a holder body having inlet and outlet passages, means for detachably securing an aerosol container in communication with the inlet passage and means for securing fluid dispersing means to the outlet passage and actuator means in the body for engaging and opening the aerosol valve when a door is opened.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,273,756 issued to Levy et al. on Sep. 20, 1966 (“the '756 patent”) teaches a device for the automatic treatment of the air in a room and, more particularly to a device for the automatic spraying of the air in a room, as with a sterilizing, de-odorizing or perfuming spray. The '756 patent teaches that when the frame containing a dispenser is in place and the door is opened, the top edge of the door will engage the projecting resilient strip and will move and offset it and the bar extension outwardly and upwardly to clear the door top without any difficulty and without any effect on the pressure dispenser. However, when the door is closed, its edge will engage against the outer face of the strip projection and press it inwardly towards the frame, causing the strip and the bar extension to which it is attached to be pushed towards the supporting frame and thereby lowering the bar section and its extension onto the nozzle head, to depress the same, causing a discharge of spray through the valve of the pressure dispenser that is opened by such nozzle head movement.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,808,553 issued to Cunningham on Sep. 15, 1998 (“the '553 patent”) teaches an apparatus for unlocking the door to a hygienic area formed by a circuit having a pair of series connected, normally open push button switches disposed in spaced apart relation at lateral limits of a lavatory. The '553 patent teaches that when the switch buttons are simultaneously depressed for a predetermined time, as by the little finger of each hand of a worker, soap sprays from overhead spray heads on the worker's hands, and after the predetermined time delay, unlocks the door.
The '553 patent teaches that upon the entry, the door automatically locks behind the worker and will not open until a certain sequence of steps are performed by the worker using the facilities. The '553 patent teaches that the worker, using both little fingers of his hands, pushes dual buttons on opposite sides of a lavatory simultaneously which sprays a quantity of disinfectant soap on his hands and closes a circuit and unlocking the door.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,320,418 issued to Sassoon on Jan. 22, 2008 (“the '418 patent”) teaches controlled sanitizing by dispensing a germicide, such as a disinfectant, antibacterial solution or cleansing agent at intervals. The system taught by the '418 patent can include a housing sized to seat an aerosol can and a control circuit that operates to momentarily open a valve on the aerosol can through action of a gear system upon an aerosol delivery tube. The '418 patent teaches a sensor that responds to displacement of the delivery tube to deliver state signals to the control circuit. The control circuit taught by the '418 patent prevents action of the gear system in the event that the state signals fail at least one prescribed condition. The '418 patent also teaches a method that registers at least the displacement of the delivery tube via the sensor and prevents subsequent displacements and hence subsequent sanitizing in the event that the sensor has not registered at least the displacement of the delivery tube. The method taught by the '418 patent ensures that a suitable aerosol can has been properly loaded in the dispenser. The '418 patent also teaches that the motor actuation cycle can be suppressed if certain external conditions are detected such as the presence of a hand of a person in the vicinity of the sanitizer unit 200.
Therefore, the present invention is needed to improve sanitization, hygiene, and cleanliness. The present invention is also needed to sterilize the user's hands to maintain a clean environment. The present invention is also needed to require a person to clean his hands before passing through a barrier to access a particular area.